new feature on the blog

I upgraded the blog, it now ranks the links on the left based on who has updated theirs most recently. The only one that won't do that is Bethany's - for whatever reason, hers shows as no live feed. Too technical for me to figure out, but hopefully if you want to stay at the top, you just keep updating your blog. Same goes for me. I will work on more updates!

Heading to the Rock

Well after waffling back & forth many times about what to do for Labor Day weekend, we are heading to Orcas Island to see my family and relax. My boss has graciously given me Friday off and Justin's restaurant is closed on Monday, so that is a 4 day weekend.

We are braving the high cost of gas to travel across the state. Hopefully Caden can handle another long car ride... we will have Dvd's and books, and I will be in the back with him for entertainment. :)

It sounds like Justin will even get to do some salmon fishing and crabbing with my dad.

Hope to put up pictures again soon.

blast from the past

This was my post from last year this week 8-24-07 I just thought it was fun to look back. It's hard to believe what has happened in just 1 short year:

The family is back together again - at last! I made it to Spokane in 2 1/2 days of driving. We are all living in the townhouse and my mom is here helping us get settled. Our stuff arrives on Monday and is unloaded on Tuesday. Caden starts daycare on Thursday and I start my job on theTuesday after Labor Day. That's right, you read correct, I have a job! I am the new Convention Sales Manager for the Spokane Convention Visitors Bureau. My market will be the southwest, so don't worry Phoenix, you haven't seen the last of me.I will get some pictures up from our vacation in Rhode Island soon. We just got the computer set-up today - almost a week after getting here.Now if our house could just sell, we would be moving right along....

We are enjoying our new home, new jobs and new city. We are working on being locals - we went to the pow wow (actually just walked around) and are getting out in the city. We love Spokane! It really is Near Nature. Near Perfect. :) If you want to see some videos of the area, go to the CVB website www.visitspokane.com. You might even see Justin in one of them. :)

Fun in the tri-cities

We went on a quick road trip to the Tri-Cities to visit my brother Pete & his wife Vanessa. We had so much fun. We played in the pool all day, barbecued and even had some of the cow. (Pete & Vanessa bought a cow, named it hamburger and had it butchered). It was delicious.
Caden could not get enough of the waterslide. He definitely wore us out. It was a great day of family pool fun!

An adventure with United Airlines

As some of you know, I have been on a whirlwind visit of the midwest the last few days. I flew to Chicago, gave a quick presentation to a board, drove to Madison Wisconsin the next morning, and then to Milwaukee Wisconsin to fly home. My drive from Chicago to Madison was an adventure. I had to stop 5 times for tolls. Some of you may think I am exaggerating, nope, there were really that many tolls. I forgot to get a roll of quarters before I left downtown, so I had to stop at a 7-11 and get cash and then quarters. Then I was off. I didn't know exactly how long it would take, but at 11:45 I realized I still had 45 minutes of driving, but was supposed to be there at noon. I made some calls to let them know of my delay. All was well. I toured around Madison and saw their meeting facilities, botanical garden and the UW campus. It is a cute small town. It is the same size as Spokane. They do have a trader joes and whole foods, which Spokane does not. I was a little jealous of that. When I left to drive to Milwaukee, my directions were not great to the freeway. I powered through and got on the right freeway. No tolls this time which was nice.

I returned my rental car, turns out you are penalized if you return it in a different state than you rent it. Hertz made a killing on my Hyundai Sonata! When I checked my bag for $15 at United, they pulled me aside to let me know that my flight was delayed (I was 2 hours early!!!!) But they would put me on a flight that was leaving in 10 minutes so I better run to the gate. Holy moly! I ran! When I got to the gate, they had a computer glitch. The gate person said "Go ahead and get on the plane, choose any seat you like" I was on United, not southwest, so I was confused. I got on the plane. There were only about 12 other people. Pretty wierd. Then they told everyone to spread out. They couldn't take off with everyone in the front. So we all scattered. Then we were out on the runway getting ready for takeoff and they announced it was a false alarm. They said we could use our phones and just hang out, it would be about 20 minutes until we would be cleared again. Pretty crazy.

The flight was only 20 minutes long. After arriving at O'hare, I realized that there are a ton of people here who have been delayed and bumped and cancelled. I couldn't find any plae to eat without a large line. O'hare is crazy. My flight to Spokane, everything that I have read and seen, I do not have a seat. When I checked in last night, I still didn't have a seat, but when I printed my boarding pass I did. I was worried I might not make it to Spokane, but it looks like I will. I am in O'hare right now, so lets hope I make it!

Random things I do at work

Today while getting my presentation ready at work, I needed to show how much of a walking city Spokane can be. So I found a pedometer and went to work at walking the distances between hotels & the convention center, as well as the mall. Overall I walked about 3,000 steps. That is less than a 1/3 of the steps you are supposed to walk in a day. So the end result is - You don't have to walk too far to go anywhere in Downtown Spokane. You can even walk to Nordstroms. How many downtown areas can say that... (Seattle & Portland - yes, Phoenix & Denver - no)

The other cool thing I found when researching walkability is a website called walkscore. you type in your address to find how walkable your neighborhood is. Spokane got an 84, which is very walkable. It's pretty cool to see what comes out.

Excitement in Spokane again

I went to upload pictures of the weekend, but blogger wouldn't let me. The website is challenged tonight. It has been so warm here and it finally just cooled off. that is because a storm just blew in. Along with the storm, came lightning. There is a wildfire burning somewhere nearby (small area near Davenport Washington). It definitely smells smokey & campfirey outside.

Too bad my dad was just sent to Bend to fight a fire, he could have come here again. :)

I am getting ready for my Chicago trip, I leave early on Wednesday. I get back late on Friday. There is a BBQ at kindercare and Caden will be performing for us. I can only imagine. I think it will be the itsy bitsy spider. Should be fun.

Another Scorcher...

No pictures today, but it was hot this weekend. We spent the weekend doing water activities. Friday night was the splash pad at the park. Saturday was the slip & slide at the Rings. Sunday was our new $5 sprinkler from wallmart. It was a big hit since it was 100 degrees out. Both Justin and I agreed - wasn't this why we left phoenix? The heat?

Oh well, Caden did good. We also had Pete & Vanessa over for breakfast on Sunday. Vanessa got to read some books to Caden, so it was fun for all.

Caden's future elementary school

Caden has been waking up at 4am lately and wanting to play. Well that is a lot to handle. He gets out of bed and pounds on his door until we let him out. Today, I made him go back to bed, and then he slept in until 9am! That was great, but we were supposed to go to the pool. Lucky for us, it was a little overcast. So Jeannette, Charlie & Annie came over and we walked down the hill to Caden's future school. We played on the playground. It is a little advanced for these toddlers, but we tried to be safe and have fun.

Caden liked this bridge, it shook when you walked on it. There were some slides too. They liked those as well. Then it started to rain. We had to make a break for it. Luckily Justin was home and heard the rain, so he came down to get us in the car. I have a bum foot right now, so we put the stroller in and headed up the hill. Jeannette is tougher than I am, she pushed her double stroller up the hill. We had lunch and then they went home. What a fun day!

Well, I think everyone is caught up now. I am going to Chicago in a week & a half for a presentation. We are babysitting Annie & Charlie next Saturday so Jeannette & Matt can go to a wedding. Should be a fun slumber party!

Kids day at Riverfront park

Here in Spokane, we have lots of parks. I tell my clients about them, but don't always go to them on a day off. This weekend, we hit the park. It was Kids day at Riverfront park. There were lots of vendors there with free things for kids. Caden got a toothbrush and some elmo stickers. Since we were there, we went on the carousel again. No bargain this time. Caden was free, but Justin's ticket was $2. A little bit more than the 50 cents last week. Oh well, it was fun. Then we met up with my sister for the sesame street show. Did anyone know that Sesame street is turning 40 this year? Pretty amazing.

We were all in agreement that these were not the greatest sesame street characters. What do you expect at a free show. Cookie monster's eyes were wierd.

It was still fun. Caden was more interested in Charlie's capri sun and baby Annie, but once they played the music, he loved it.

How we spend our time.

I came home the other day and this is what I found - Caden runnig around shirtless in his little moccasin shoes. He is like a little tarzan boy. The next day I got him dressed up and we were headed to the Carousel. See how cute he is.
When we got to the carousel, the camera battery died. No pictures of the carousel ride. It was fun though and it was only 50 cents. A special discount for the park's 30th anniversary.

Caden wasn't feeling well for a few days, so Justin took him to Cat Tales on his day off. There weren't any pictures taken of Caden at the "zoo", just the animals. They even saw a Liger. I think this is an albino tiger.

Driving home from Orcas

On the way home from Orcas, we stopped in Leavenworth. Forgot to take pictures. No bavarian village pics for Caden. Another time. After Leavenworth, we stopped at the petting zoo. It was great. They had little cars for Caden to drive around and you could feed the animals. The animals were kind of special needs. Most had been rescued or had a birth defect, but it was pretty entertaining. There were goats, donkeys, chickens, llamas, a cow, sheep and a pig.


Caden really liked the wooden horse he could ride. At the end was a playground. Of course caden found the dirt and sat in it and got a handful of it to throw around. We dusted him off and headed home.

Orcas part 2

Charlie is checking out caden's fire hat. This was after the parade, we were waiting to meet up with everyone. We walked to the market and stopped to pet the horse. Caden even said Neigh while he pet the horse.

When we got back to the house, we went for a boat ride. Caden even got to drive the boat with Grandpa.

A quick trip to Orcas for the fourth of july

I am finally able to upload some pics again! We went to Orcas for the 4th of July to hang out with my family. My sister's family came too. It was so fun for my parents to have all the grandkids in the same place, even if it was for just a short visit. We tried to get a picture of everyone looking at the camera. After 6 takes, this one has 3 people looking my way. Caden prefers to touch Annie and say baby. My dad and Justin went Crabbing. I think they only got 3 crab, which isn't that bad, except the next week my brother got something like 22. Hopefully next year we can get a lot of crab. We wanted Caden to hold the crab up, but we figured he might throw it. Don't worry, it's already cooked so it couldn't pinch him.
This is Caden riding the exercise bike. My parents found this at a garage sale. It looks like it has brakes, but it's actually the gears. Caden wanted to climb this every morning.
Another exciting part of the weekend, Caden got to be in the parade. He rode on the Orcas Fire truck. It was pretty fun. There was actually a big fire on the island the night before, and the truck was parked too close to the fire, so the lights melted and the windshield cracked from the heat. That truck couldn't be in the fire. Caden did well until he saw us. Then he teared up a bit.
We even had a celebrity guest at the pancake breakfast. Governor Gregoire stopped by to meet & greet everyone. My dad made her flip some pancakes. Very exciting to be on Orcas for the weekend.